


chaser of fate

by freshia



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, Humor, M/M, Reincarnation, basically no angst its happy and funny, she/her pronouns for pidge, who is mostly referred to as Katie
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-28
Updated: 2016-10-02
Packaged: 2018-08-18 07:03:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 7,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8153218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/freshia/pseuds/freshia
Summary: Where Lance thinks everyone else is really frickin' weird, the others spend copious amounts of time trying to get him to just remember, and Keith just wants to (re?)live his life.(Modern Reincarnation AU where the biggest threat to face, is the looming deadlines for essays.)





	1. chaser of fate

And I meant everything I said that night  
I will come back to life  
But only for you  
[Only for you](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7t8IaeWxCA)

-Panic! At The Disco

/

/

 

 

Allura is kind of…

Well, you know. Allura is _Allura_ , is kind and way gorgeous and sort of a hardass, when she wants to be.

She also, apparently, doesn’t hold her alcohol well.

(This is news to Lance.)

“He’s just… You _knowww_.” she drags out the words as she traces shapes in the air with her index finger--if she’s trying to make a specific shape, Lance sure can’t tell what it is. He’s never even seen her like this, with all her walls down. Her accent is extra thick, as more words fall from her lips. “Don’t you think, Lance?”

Lance distinctly feels like this is a trick question. “Um… I mean, yeah, sure.”

She swirls the wine around in the glass with her other hand, levels him with a unsmiling look. “Lance. Please, I’m being serious.”

He throws his hands up in surrender. “Hey, I’m sorry! I’ve only met the guy like, twice?” to be honest, Lance doesn’t really know why she’s here. Not that he doesn’t enjoy her company, and not that they’re not friends, but they aren’t exactly… Gossip over wine sort of friends.

Lance is pretty sure he’s not even a gossip over anything sort of _person_. Allura groans into her arms.

“Oh, Lance, you’re no help at all.”

“How am I supposed to be helping?” he asks, incredulously. She looks back up at him, sad blue eyes in a pout that he didn’t even know she was capable of achieving.

“You’re always so friendly, and flirting with other people, so I thought maybe you would know,” she sighs, somewhat longingly. “Have you ever just looked at someone and thought you were meant to be? It’s _romantic_ , Lance. Like, warm, and fuzzy.”

“I think that might be the wine talking,” he offers, but quickly backs up when she sends him a glare. “Sorry, sorry. Have you tried.. Flirting with him?”

She shakes her head vehemently. “No, no! That would be… Inappropriate.”

Lance can’t help it. He cocks his head slightly to the side. “... You both work at Starbucks, and it’s not like he’s your boss or anything… You’re just regular employees…”

Allura hums thoughtfully. “I don’t know. I can’t place it, but it feels weird. Like… Mmm. I don’t know. I don’t want to take advantage of the _situation_.”

Now he’s just totally lost. “What situation?”

“The…” she starts to answer, and then looks confused. “I’m… Not sure, actually.”

God, Lance honestly loves Allura--and he loves hanging around her even more, because he feels like he’s getting some sort of contact-beautiful just by breathing in her air--but he decides right then that from now on, he has to love himself enough to not drink with her ever again.

 

/

 

“This is my new friend from class, Keith.” Katie says one day, bringing along someone extra to their study group. Both Hunk and Lance look up from their laptops, because this is uncharted waters, right here. None of them had _ever_ brought someone new to their study group that they’d had going since High School. “He just transferred in from a community college.”

Any snarky comment Lance was thinking about saying dies in his throat, because he was feeling _warm_ and _fuzzy_ , and he hadn’t had any wine since that night with Allura.

 

/

 

The more he thinks about it, the more he thinks _knows_ this kid from somewhere.

“I really don’t think so.” Katie says, when Lance asks her about it. “He’s from out of state. I have no idea when you would have ever met him.”

Lance scratches his chin. “Oh, is he a pornstar?”

“ _Lance_.”

He shrugs. “Just trying to cover all my bases, here.”

 

/

 

Lance really, really can’t get this out of his head. He starts following Keith around one day when he runs into him in the library, badgering him for answers between the rows of bookshelves.

“Do you run a Youtube channel?”

“No.”

“Ever made national news?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“... Are you _sure_ you’re not a pornstar.”

“Yes. Can you _please_ leave me alone now, I’m seriously trying to find this book.”

Lance shrugs. “I am gonna figure it out, one of these days. You really don’t recognize _me_ from anywhere?” not that he was famous or something, but Lance thought he had an attractive enough face to be memorable. Yeah.

Keith pauses, turns to face Lance with one arm rest on his hip and a slight frown on his face. He looks him up and down for a moment.

“... Don’t remember. Must have never happened.” he turns back toward the shelf, and pulls a book out to examine it’s cover. Lance’s eyebrows furrow.

“ _What_ never happened?” he asks, and Keith shoves the book back into it’s place so hard the entire shelf wobbles.

“Nothing. Bye.” he says, tersely, before walking off and leaving a very confused Lance behind.

 

/

 

Keith starts coming around more, and Lance doesn’t like it. Well, actually, he _does_ like it--but Keith still won’t give up how he knows Lance, and Lance _knows_ he’s lying, so he takes it out by fighting with Keith. About everything.

It’s kind of satisfying, in a way.

“Will you two both stop?” Allura asks, and oh _yeah_ , Allura’s been around a lot more too. Lance doesn’t really get why--he’s sure she has other graduate students she could hang out with, instead of _their_ lame undergrad asses, but he’s also totally not complaining. She drags Shiro with her a lot, even though they’re… Not…? Dating?

(At least, the last time he asked she had said they weren’t.)

They kind of have a cool little squad going on. Even the weird librarian Coran comes over to chat with them sometimes, which is kind of funny to Lance because he didn’t even know that guy had a name.

“I’m not doing anything!” Keith says in reply to Allura, frustrated. Lance is amused to no end by this. Allura gives them the most displeased Mom Look she can muster, and he can hardly believe this is the same woman he talked to over wine that one time.

Lance _distinctly_ hears Katie mumble: “they wouldn’t be so insufferable if they’d just get rid of all that unresolved sexual tension already…” and he snaps his attention to her with a scowl.

“I heard that, _Pidge_ ,” he says, and then immediately stills, because who the hell is Pidge? And everyone else kind of freezes up, too--with varying degrees of confusion on their face. Keith is looking at Lance like he’s trying to figure something out, and Pidge-- _Katie_ , who the _hell_ is _Pidge_ \--is looking like she just _did_ figure something out.

“What did you say?” she asks, and Lance starts sweating.

“Uh--Guess I have Pokemon? On the brain?” it sounds more like a question than a statement, and she shuts her laptop before standing up and announcing that she had to go to the bathroom.

Keith sends Lance a _weird_ look (he can’t think of any other way to describe it, honestly,) and follows behind her, jogging slightly to catch up.

Lance thinks he’s losing his damn mind.

 

/

 

The other start acting super weird after that, one by one, and Lance takes back what he thought before. He’s pretty sure it’s not him losing his mind, it’s _everyone else_.

 

/

 

It starts off with Hunk, who has a sudden newfound interest in green Jello.

Which would be fine--Lance is an open-minded enough individual, he doesn’t judge his friends for their weird… Obsessions. Lance loves Hunk no matter what and he will be his best bro, forever and ever, _bromance_ until the very world itself _brobliterates_ and all that’s left is just a _brodicum_ of what it once was, stardust and atoms.

But when Hunk starts trying to force his weird Jello onto Lance, that’s where a line must be drawn. Hunk had been taught many manners, but apparently no one had taught him that you can pick your friends, you can pick your nose, but you can't force feed your friends green Jello.

“Dude,” Lance says, as he pushes away the Jello cup, “I love lime as much as the next person. But this is getting excessive.”

“They’re good! You can’t knock it until you’ve tried it, Lance.” Hunk insists, shoving the cup back toward him. Lance raises an eyebrow, shakes his head.

“Hunk. I did try it. The _first_ five cups. But all you’ve been eating for the past week I’ve been around you is this green gelatin, and to be honest? I’m worried, bro.” he shoves the cup back again. It’s unnatural green color jiggles and taunts him. “Are you having pregnant cravings? Eating your feelings from a bad breakup? _Do I need to get everyone together to stage an intervention_?”

Looking oddly disappointed, Hunk sighs and puts away the Jello. Thank _God_. “You’re right, man. Sorry. I won’t bring it up again.”

Lance nods, relieved that his friend is free from the wiggling green monster that had consumed his soul.

What he doesn’t know is that this, this is only the beginning.

 

/

 

Shiro is next.

“Hey, Lance. How do you feel about cats?”

Lance kind of scrunches his nose up. It wasn’t very often it was just him and Shiro alone--and he didn’t mind it, but it felt kind of… Set-up. Everyone else had very convenient, last second plans for today’s group-up, suspiciously.

"Um… Neutrally… Positive?” with so many brothers and sisters, they never had any pets around. It was for the best, trust him. No animal deserves to live through some of the things he’s had to see. “They’re cute in videos.”

“How about _lions_?”

“... Uh,” he looks around, to make sure that none of the others were hiding somewhere and secretly snickering at him or something, like this is some sort of weird prank. “I don’t know…?”

“What if the lion was colored blue?”

“You can dye them?” Lance asks, and Shiro sighs. He’s so confused; what was going on? What did Shiro _want_ from him?

“Okay, how do you feel about… Robots?”

“Oh, robots are cool.” Lance answers immediately. Shiro seems to perk up a bit at this.

“Really?”

“Oh yeah. I watched so much _Transformers_ as a kid.”

“... Nevermind, Lance. Thanks anyway.”

Lance throws his arms up in an over exaggerated shrug as Shiro gets up from the table and walks away. What was _his_ issue? _What was that even all about_?

 

/

 

“Oh, Lance. Are you free tonight?”

Lance squints at Allura as he shovels green Jello into his mouth. ( _What_ , he had a lot left over from what Hunk gave him!)

“I mean, I always keep a slot scheduled open, just for you,” he says, with a wink, and then tacks on, “But aren’t you and Shiro--”

“Not a _date_ date.” she clarifies, quickly, holding up two DVDs. They both looked like… Alien documentaries. “Just, you know, some hang-out time! We haven’t had that lately.”

 _That’s because the last time we did you drank my entire bottle of wine_ , Lance thinks bitterly, but doesn’t say that out loud because life is too good to be ending _that_ quickly. Instead, he nods… Hesitantly.

“Uh, sure. But for the record, I think that looks more up Keith’s alley.”

Allura’s frown falls slightly, just for a moment. “But don’t you like space, too? And aliens?”

“Well, yeah. Who doesn’t?”

“Then it’s settled! Coran even helped me find these, isn’t that sweet?”

So they watch the documentaries together, later that night, and whatever Allura was expecting from it must not happen because she leaves looking slightly sad and he’s left in his room, feeling very, very confused.

 

/

 

“Keith, why are we the only normal ones?”

Keith sends him a look that just reads ‘if you’re going to say something stupid, keep it to yourself,’ but Lance carries on anyway because he never _ever_ shuts up.

“I mean, seriously. Katie’s been weird since I called her that other name, Hunk is obsessed with lime jelly, Shiro is trying to dye big cats and either Allura’s been playing too much Mass Effect--which is _unlikely_ , I don’t even know if she plays video games--or she’s just randomly obsessed with aliens all of a sudden.”

Keith shrugs.

“Come on, dude. You haven’t noticed it?”

“I have,” he starts, “But maybe they aren’t the ones that are weird, you are. Ever considered that?”

Lance snorts. “Uh, sure, if your definition of normal is spending your entire paycheck on _gelatin_.”

Keith stares at him for a moment, and then wordlessly turns back to his computer. Lance lets out an annoyed huff.

“Hey, don’t just ignore me! This is _serious_ stuff, here.”

“God,” Keith finally says, fingers stilling over the keyboard. He’s still not looking at Lance. “ _Of course_ you’d be the last to--This sucks.”

The sudden honesty shocks Lance into so much silence, he doesn’t mention it again.

 

/

 

Lance finds himself seeking out Keith’s company a lot more often, lately--which he would chock up to not wanting to be around the others while they’re totally weird, but things actually _have_ started to settle back into whatever constitutes as “normal” in their little group.

In all honesty, Lance just kind of likes being around him. Keith, surprisingly, doesn’t seem to mind either.

(He tries not to think about it too much.)

They don’t even really have an excuse to be hanging around each other today. Lance was done with studying for the week, and he knew Keith had already finished his project that was due. They were both just sort of… There, in Keith’s apartment.

“Do you think Shiro and Allura ever got together?” Lance questions, out loud. It’s more of a general question--he doesn’t really expect Keith to know that, since Allura keeps darting around the question whenever even Lance asks--but Keith clicks his tongue.

“Yeah.”

Lance sends him a bewildered look. Their legs are almost brushing, next to each other on the couch, and for some reason this doesn’t bother Lance. “Wait, how do you know that?”

“They’re soulmates, destined to be together through space and time.”

Lance gapes. Keith keeps a completely still face, before his composure finally breaks and he looks away, covering his mouth with his palm to stifle a snicker. “I’m just kidding. Shiro told me.”

“I knew you weren’t that romantic!” Lance says, practically shouting. “I can’t believe you actually have a sense of humor, though.”

Keith stares at him for a moment, smile dropping. “Yeah, there’s a lot you don’t know, huh.”

 

/

 

They’re having a _midterms are over_ celebration when suddenly, Allura busts out the alcohol. Everyone stares at her, in varying shades of surprise and awe, and she shrugs.

“What? We’ve all worked hard, and everyone deserves a good time sometimes.” she adds the last bit with a wink.

Lance has never been much of a drinker, but these are his friends, his _best friends_ , and drinking with them sounds about a million times better than at some random frat party.

(Plus, he’s determined to find that perfect balance, that special thin, thin line where _‘I’m having a good, plastered time_ ’ stops and ‘ _I’m worshipping the porcelain throne’_ starts. Once you’ve mastered that, you’ve mastered _everything_.)

At some point, their friendly game of beer pong disintegrates into Katie asleep on the couch, Allura and Shiro slow dancing to whatever music was playing on the movie that was on TV, and Hunk laughing at cat videos from his phone on the floor. Keith and Lance are the only ones still going, and by this point Lance can’t even hardly see straight enough to throw the ball anywhere _near_ the remaining cups.

“You win for now, Keithy,” he slurs, using his index and middle finger to point to his own eyes, then point at Keith’s. “But only because, _I’m_ giving up.”

“Then that means I beat you fair and square!” Keith huffs, just as inebriated. Lance rolls his eyes and then lays on the ground, scooting toward his backpack. Keith frowns as he watches him, grabs the side of the counter to steady himself. “What’re you _doing_?”

“Getting gum so I don’t have booze-breath, duh,” Lance says, like everyone chews gum after they drink. Keith frowns as Lance unzips his backpack and pulls out a pack.

“Why are you on the ground?”

“Comfy.”

Keith arcs an eyebrow, and goes to step over him--but his balance isn’t as good as he thought it was, and instead he trips right _onto_ him. He topples down, falling on Lance with an ‘oof’ from both of them, and it’s… Quite the compromising position.

“If you wanted to straddle me, you just had to say so,” Lance says, suggestively wiggling his eyebrows. Keith looks like he maybe wants to rip them off, face reddening.

“I’m not trying to straddle you!” he shouts, and then self consciously snaps his head up to look around. Hunk is now passed out on the ground, next to where Katie is on the couch, and Allura and Shiro are mysteriously missing. Lance stares at him.

“I could kiss you.”

Keith freezes. He looks down, and their faces are surprisingly close. “... Your breath smells like juicy-fruit.”

Ah, eloquent. The serious look falls off Lance’s face as he grins. “Guess my lips are too _fruitylicious_ for ya, babe.”

Keith promptly rolls off of Lance and runs into the bathroom. At the vomiting noises that follow, Lance is suddenly very glad he _didn’t_ kiss Keith.

 

/

 

Lance thought that maybe spending more time around Keith would make that feeling of familiarity, of _I know you from somewhere_ go away, but it doesn’t. If anything, it makes it stronger, and it chews at him like an itch he just can’t seem to reach.

He reverse image searches, Googles his name, stares at pictures of Keith on his phone (when did he take so _many_?) until he feels like his eyes are dry.

 _Maybe I_ am _the one going crazy_ , he thinks, before he finally can’t stay awake any longer.

 

/

 

“What you said that one day about, uh, soulmates and all that junk. Do you believe in that?”

Keith regards him, suspiciously. “It was a joke.”

“Yeah, but do you believe in it?”

He’s silent for a moment. “I used to, but lately I’m _really_ starting to wonder.”

 

/

 

“Katie, I’ve got a big issue.”

She doesn’t even look up from her laptop. “What is it now.”

“What do you do, when you want to… Kiss someone?”

Her fingers pause, hands hovering over her keyboard as she looks up at him. Her eyes are flat. “Christ, Lance, just kiss him already.”

He’s acutely aware of the fact that he hadn’t mentioned any gender, but Katie has always been kind of perceptive, so he ignores it. “But what if it’s a huge mistake, and… And it makes everything awkward?”

She buries her face into her hands, making some sort of noise that could only be defined as unique to her. He’s pretty sure most _animals_ couldn’t make a sound that frustrated sounding.

“How many _lifetimes_ do I have to suffer through because your brain, despite being the result of _god knows how many cycles_ , is so thick that I could probably throw a brick at your skull at it and it would _bounce off_.”

Lance is simultaneously so confused and offended, that he doesn’t even have a snappy comeback.

 

/

 

Keith must be in a particularly sour mood today, because when Lance comes over--like he always does, it’s become almost a ritual at this point--he pops in some earbuds and completely ignores him.

“Uh, wanna play some--”

“No.”

Lance frowns. At the very least, he could let him finish his sentences. “Wow, fine, okay. I didn’t want to play with you anyways.”

“Good.” Keith spits, and cranks up the volume so loud that _Lance_ can hear the music. He scowls, but whatever. If Keith has something shoved so far up his ass that he’s decided to be a complete dick to Lance, fine.

Lance has other things to focus on, anyway. He clicks his pen and taps it on his notebook.

Totally. He even had a paper to write.

Absolute--Okay, GOD, he can’t do this anymore. What even was his life? His friends asking weird questions, feeling like there was some sort of deeper connection to them all, _that stupid itch he can’t reach_. Lance slams his pen down onto the table, loud enough that Keith hears it over his dumb banging music, and glares at him.

“Don’t break my table.” he says, pulling one headphone out of his ear, and then all of a sudden Lance is _right there_.

“Stop that!” he shouts, and he’s aware that he’s violating Keith’s personal space like one _thousand_ times over but he doesn’t even care. “All of you guys are being weird, and holding a secret from me, and I’m not! Stupid! And I _know_ I know you from somewhere, so just…”

Keith is staring at him, like _really_ staring at him, and Lance thinks that maybe his dark purple eyes are going to shoot out violet rays and melt him into the ground, it’s a look so intense. He’s so distracted he doesn’t even finish his sentence, trailing off lamely, suddenly realizing how _very_ close their faces were.

He presses their lips together, so fast and sudden, that he’s almost surprised when Keith even responds. He fists his hands into the front of Keith’s shirt, and Keith wraps his arms around Lance and runs his hands through messy brown locks. It’s so good that they don’t even part until they have to, until Lance has to pull back and gasp for air.

“Cargo pilot,” Keith wheezes, and Lance is--

Lance is in space and on foreign planets and meeting aliens, Lance is piloting a giant blue lion on a rescue mission, Lance is beat up and bruised and bloodied, and Lance is stumbling out of the healing pod and Keith _his_ Keith is there and,

“We were _heroes_ ,” he says, breathlessly, and the relief on Keith’s face is so obvious it’s painful.

“I can’t believe it took you this long.” Keith says, “Everyone else remembered months ago--”

“Shut up,” Lance says, and Keith does, because he pushes their lips back together and Lance feels like he’s on fire.

(In a good way.)

 

/

 

The roof to Shiro’s apartment is technically off limits--but it’s one of the tallest buildings around, and one of the few that you can actually see the stars from within the city.

They all lay on the ground in a circle, heads nearly touching as gaze upward. It’s nearly 11PM, so really, _who’s_ going to catch them anyway?

“It isn’t quite as pretty as it is where you’re there,” Allura comments, next to Shiro, and he hums in agreement.

“But it is nice to have a steady home.” Hunk replies, and Lance laces his fingers with Keith’s and thinks back to how badly he used to _want_ this, to be able to come back to Earth again.

But now…

Now he thinks that (as _cheesy_ as it is,) he doesn’t want to be anywhere that Keith isn’t.

“Guess home _is_ where your heart is.” Lance whispers, low enough that Keith only barely hears it. He looks at him, briefly, before turning away--but Lance doesn’t miss the small smile across his lips.

 


	2. chaser of love

Don't wanna call it a second chance  
But when I came back, it was more of a relapse  
Anticipation's on the other line  
An obsession called while you were out  
([Yeah, it called while you were out](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n7t8IaeWxCA))

-Panic! At The Disco

/

/

 

Keith had always kind of just... Known.

Like when he was a child, and he’d dream of space and robots and flying _so_ vivid that he couldn’t tell the difference between what was a memory, and what was his imagination--when at some point he realized that most kids don’t have such vivid fantasies.

So when he realizes it’s weird, he stops talking about it.

(The memories--or dreams, or whatever they were never really fade out though, and so sometimes at night he climbs onto the top of his roof from his window, and looks up at the stars.)

 

/

 

When he finishes community, he applies to a state college. He picks one almost at random--like he’s acting on pure instinct. (Which honestly, fits him fine.)

He knows he’ll get in; he’s got a 4.0 despite his occasionally spotty attendance record and hasn’t failed an exam since he was in middle school.

And when he sees Pidge in his first class, he wonders if maybe there’s something to all that cosmic destiny bullcrap after all.

“I’m Katie,” she introduces herself, and he can only think, _I know_. “You don’t really seem like you need any help, but… I have two friends I usually hang out with and study, if you wanna come along.”

He isn’t sure if she’s doing it to be nice, or what, but he thinks… If Pidge is here, then he’s pretty sure he knows who those _two friends_ are.

“Okay,” he says, and his stomach is tying itself into knots even thinking about it. She gives him an excited smile--genuine, (he knows this like he knows everything else, because he _recognizes_ it), and they leave for the library.

He can’t even begin to process the emotions that surge forward when he finally sees Lance. Pidge is introducing him to them and he zones her out, thinks about Lance’s smile and Lance’s laugh and Lance’s _touch_.

( _It’s kind of like when you have a wet dream about someone and feel all weird about it when you see them, but a million times stronger_ , he thinks, and then he’s embarrassed he even _had_ that thought.)

He can’t seem to look away from Lance, and Lance seems to be… Having the same problem, actually. Keith wonders if just maybe, maybe he wasn’t _the only one--_

And then Lance opens his mouth and says, “Heh, nice hair,” and he knows that no universe is on _his_ side.

 

/

 

Lance knows Allura and Shiro, because of course he does. Lance knows everyone, even when he doesn’t know he knows.

That is beyond frustrating.

Shiro is friendly as ever, and Allura just as stunning, and they’re dancing around each other awkwardly just like they had before. And he knows he’s probably out of line, somehow, but Shiro isn’t his _leader_ anymore, so he can’t help but ask him:

“Why don’t you ask her out?”

And Shiro looks totally surprised at that, like _how did you know_? And Keith can only laugh because he doesn’t need to have known Shiro in some sort of past life to know that the two of them were in love; the only thing he needs is a pair of eyeballs and working ears.

“... Is it that obvious?” he asks, instead, and Keith nods.

“ _Yes_.”

And then he laughs, and doesn’t answer Keith’s original question. Probably because he doesn’t have a good excuse.

 

/

 

Keith is laying on his bed, it is 2AM, and Lance is on speaker phone.

(Keith hates his life.)

“For the last time,” he says, agitated with both _Lance_ and the fact that he was on the phone instead of getting sleep (also because of _Lance_ ), “I am not a pornstar, I have never been on any porn cam sites, and if I were they’d be _too classy for you to afford anyway_!”

He isn’t really sure why he adds that last part. Lance gives out a gasp so dramatic that Keith doesn’t even need to see his face to know he’s offended.

“I’ll have you know, that my taste in porn is top notch-”

“ _Goodnight_ , Lance,” Keith says, and promptly hangs up before that conversation can get any further.

 

/

 

When Lance calls Katie “ _Pidge”_ , she gets this look in her eyes like he’s just dropped a bag of bricks onto her favorite computer.

There is no way that that just happened.

Keith stares at Lance, trying to figure it out--was that something that _he_ let slip, and Lance picked up on? But no, Keith had never called her Pidge. Not in _this_ lifetime, at least.

Lance tries to laugh it off when she confronts him, and then Pidge stands up and excuses herself from the table. No one else looks like they have _any_ idea of what just transpired, and Keith sends Lane one _very_ confused stare before getting up to follow her.

“... Katie?” he asks, once they’re clearly out of earshot. She pauses in the middle of the library.

“Pidge,” he tries, again, and this time she turns around, and he knows that _she_ knows. “How much do you…”

“Everything.” she replies, and stares at him. He thinks there’s a hint of sympathy in there. “You knew all this time?”

“Yeah,” he replies. She backs up, leaning against a bookcase and putting a hand to her temple.

“Jeez. I’d have dreams, sometimes, but…” she pauses, looks back up at him. “No one else knows? Lance doesn’t know."

“Nope.” Keith answers, and she sends him a pitying look.

“We have a lot to catch up on. Maybe everyone else will remember eventually.”

“I hope so,” he says, and that’s that.

 

/

 

Shiro and Allura are next, at the exact same time because _of course_ they are, and Keith is lucky enough to be there to witness it.

He goes into the Starbucks they work at--and they’re both scheduled for the same shift, and no one else happens to be there, so Allura takes his order and Shiro makes it and then they all sit down to chat.

“By the way, Shiro,” Allura starts, “How’s your cat doing?”

Keith is barely paying attention, taking a sip of his coffee, but he almost spits it out when Shiro replies, “Oh, Blackie? She’s good! She just had the kittens, and I was thinking it would be fitting to name them after other colors--”

And then he cuts himself off, and kind of sits there, and Keith’s eyes are darting back and forth between the two of them.

“Ah,” Shiro says, kind of quietly, and Allura seems to have come to the same conclusion because they both stare at each other for a long moment. Keith clears his throat and stands up, picking up his coffee.

“I’m gonna… Go,” he says, because this moment is way too intimate and they look like they need some time. “You can call me when you get stuff figured out.”

 

/

 

“Oh, I figured it out after hearing you and Pidge talk about it here!”

Keith frowns at Coran. “You were _listening_?”

“Well, your fault really. For talking so loud in a library, that is.”

Keith has to give him that one. Touché.

 

/

 

He isn’t there for Hunk’s revelation, but Pidge apparently _is_.

“Hunk knows.” she says, catching him after class one day before he leaves. Keith frowns.

“How did he remember?”

She pauses, looking a little sheepish. “Uh, I kind of walked up to him and said “ _Voltron_!” and then he spaced out for a second and threw up on my shoes. And then he gave me a hug. Hunk’s hugs are the _best_.”

“I know,” Keith replies, even though he hadn’t ever experienced it this time around. Not yet, anyway. “Shiro and Allura know too, so that just leaves…”

She looks down at her feet. “Lance. I’m sorry, I tried the same thing but it didn’t work.”

Keith shrugs. “Maybe he just needs more time.”

She’s quiet, for a few moments. “... Or maybe, he just needs the right trigger! I’m sure if we all work together, we can think of something!”

And Keith can’t even protest, because Pidge is already on her way out.

 

/

 

He still dreams, all the time, about it. Usually it’s piloting Red, or the way space looked from the observatory deck, or specific planets that he particularly liked.

But a lot of the time it’s also just _Lance_. Lance’s sleepy face after he wakes up in the morning (that Keith hasn’t seen in _so_ long), his pouts, his idiotic moves whenever Keith was in trouble.

It’s worse, now that Lance is there, and perfectly attainable but yet _totally_ untouchable. Keith doesn’t know whether he wants to keep his distance, or get as close as he possibly can.

(Lance doesn’t really end up giving him a choice anyway, as he starts spending more and more time hanging around Keith and Keith wonders if this is some kind of special hell made _just for him_.)

 

/

 

Lance is totally convinced that he and Keith are the only normal ones, and it takes every last bit of Keith’s willpower to not point out the fact that he was obviously the odd man out here.

Apparently, all of their attempts failed. None of them could bring his memories to the surface, and Keith somehow isn’t surprised. No one is more thickheaded than Lance, that’s how he survived hitting his head so much.

(Those paladin helmets weren’t _that_ padded.)

But Lance finally badgers him into a corner, and Keith almost says something he really would have regretted.

“Of course you’d be the last to--this _sucks_.”

He still manages to catch himself before he _really_ says something odd to Lance, but Lance is only silent after his little outburst, and Keith thinks he’s done it this time, Lance will leave their group of friends and never talk to him again and all of his chances will be _gone_.

The thought almost scares him into reaching across the table and kissing him, before he leaves once and for all--

But he doesn’t.

(Keith knows, somewhere inside, that it isn’t the right time.)

 

/

 

Lance doesn’t run away, after all that. As a matter of fact, the opposite happens:

He spends _more_ time with Keith.

(Keith is sort of dying, on the inside. It’s _fine_.)

This has two side effects:

 

  1. Lance gets more comfortable with Keith, and gets more touchy-feely. This is bad. In a sort of good way, but also just in a plain bad way. Very bad for Keith.

  2. Keith ends up saying weird things sometimes, because he can’t always control his verbal diarrhea, especially when he can talk to all the others about whatever he wants now.




 

So when Keith rambles off some really weird stuff about Shiro and Allura being destined to be together--which he was pretty sure was true, actually--he has to play it off as a joke.

It’s easier than expected, because laughing at the face Lance makes at Keith’s “ _surprisingly poetic_ ” observation is a piece of cake.

“I knew you weren’t that romantic!” he says, and Keith has to fight a scowl at that. “I can’t believe you actually have a sense of humor, though.”

You knew that. You know that. Keith thinks to himself, but luckily enough has built up enough of a filter to avoid saying _that_ out loud. Instead, he opts for:

“Yeah, there’s a lot you don’t know, huh.”

And he honestly isn’t sure if that’s much better.

 

/

 

The party is amazing, even if he doesn’t end up remembering all that much. Or, it’s more like there are black holes in his memory--he can remember what happened, but the in-between, the _how_ is gone.

What he does remember is “losing” to Lance over a game of beer pong, and then somehow tripping over him, and then Lance wiggling his eyebrows from underneath Keith’s body and saying that he could kiss him.

He’s sure there’s more to that story--like the fact that he woke up the next day in the _bathroom_ \--but for once, it’s kind of refreshing to not be the one who’s always remembering.

 

/

 

Keith isn’t sure if it’s possible to _re_ fall for someone you’ve never fallen _out of_ love with, but he’s pretty sure that’s what’s happening to him.

Lance is around him all the time now. It’s kind of nice; Keith has given up on trying to fight it and just accepted his terrible fate. He makes the best of worst, for once: ignoring the looks Lance has started to send him that make him have to avert his gaze for fear that his heart might pound straight out of his chest.

Maybe something halfway clicked on in his head that night at the party, Keith doesn’t know. But there’s something different about the way Lance is around him now, and…

He isn’t sure if it’s a good thing, or not.

 

/

 

“Why don’t you just ask him out?” Shiro parrots back at him one day, and Keith laughs.

“Oh, is it that obvious?”

Shiro pats him on the back. “Very. You know, you don’t have to wait around for him. You could just… Go for it, and when he remembers he remembers.”

Keith can’t exactly pin why, but that just feels wrong to him. He nods anyway though.

“I’ll think about it.”

 

/

 

Keith’s had a shitty day, and he’s not gonna say no to Lance wanting to hang out--he _never_ does, despite the fact that he probably _should_ \--but he pops in earbuds because honestly his bullshit-o-meter is already at max and Lance says some pretty stupid stuff sometimes.

Lance seems to get the hint, except apparently he doesn’t care since he starts talking anyway. Keith cranks up the volume to max and Lance scowls and turns toward the paper in front of him, tapping on it like he had something to write when Keith _knew_ he didn’t.

He turns his attention away again. The fact that Lance is so agitated by Keith makes him sort of feel bad--but not bad enough to take out his headphones.

Honestly, they’re for Lance’s own good. Keith was never the best at controlling his emotions, and he doesn’t want to snap at Lance over something minor that he said or did just because _Keith_ is having a shitty day and can’t say no to him.

He’s perfectly content with ignoring Lance until he slams his pen into Keith’s table, and _come on, grow up_.

“Don’t break my table,” Keith snaps, and then suddenly--

Lance is there. Like, _right_ there, right in his face. And yeah to Keith they had been like this so many other times that it shouldn’t make his pulse race like this, but it _does_. Keith doesn’t even know what to say.

“Stop that!” Lance shouts, and he’s _so close what the fuck_. He blabbers something about everyone holding secrets from him, which Keith finds ironic because everyone was trying their very hardest to _let him in on the secret_.

Lance trails off at the end of his rant, like he’s just realized how close they are when Keith has been hyper-aware of it this entire time. Of course it’s like that, that’s just how they function.

(Maybe that’s why they always made a good team.)

They’re holding each other’s gazes, and then all of a sudden Lance’s eyes flicker down to Keith’s lips, and--he goes for it.

Keith has been waiting so long for this--so long, an entire _lifetime_ long, that even though he’s not expecting it he absolutely melts under Lance.

He missed this, he _waited_ for this, for so long! Lance can’t even _imagine_ , so long, and Shiro was right he should have just done this earlier who even _cares_ if Lance doesn’t remember _this is amazing_.

Keith runs his hands through Lance’s messy hair, feeling the locks move between his fingers as they deepen their kiss and Keith is honestly amazed at himself for not doing this earlier. Apparently he had better self control that he could have ever imagined.

Lance finally pulls back, looking flushed and gasping for air, and Keith grips the back of his head.

“Cargo pilot,” he says, and really it just kind of slips out--a little inside joke between the two of them that they used to laugh about--but that does it.

Lance gets that look in his eye that makes Keith want to drag him back down and finish what they started. But instead, he watches with amazement as Lance looks back down at him and,

“We were _heroes_ ,”

And Keith is so happy he could probably die right there, and be reincarnated into another life.

(Except not really, because he just got Lance, _his Lance_ back and to have to do this all over again so soon would be _terrible_.)

He tells Lance that everyone else remembered forever ago, and then Lance shuts him up with his lips back on his and this day that started out as _so_ shitty has probably turned into the best day of his life.

(This life, that is.)

 

/

 

They stay up on the roof, even after everyone else leaves. Pidge has homework to do, Hunk is tired, and Shiro and Allura have work the next day.

“I’ll leave the door cracked for you guys,” Shiro says, before giving them and knowing smile and leaving with Allura. Keith turns his head back toward the sky.

Lance is the first one to break the silence.

(He always is, Keith doesn’t mind.)

“I’m sorry.”

Keith turns his head, frowns. “For?”

Lance squeezes his hand, gently, smiling sadly. “For not remembering. And, uh, for asking if you were a porn star. _Repeatedly_.”

Keith laughs, and rolls over so that he’s laying on top of Lance, propped up by elbows on either side of Lance’s head. “Don’t worry about it. At least you remembered in this century.” he rests his forehead against Lance’s, grinning. “But if I had known that all it took was for me to call you _Cargo Pilot_ , I would have done it ages ago.”

“Who says that’s what did it?” Lance tilts his head, so their lips are brushing as he smirks. “If I recall, something else happened right before that…”

“You’re ridiculous,” Keith says, before pressing their lips together the rest of the way.

( _Home_ , is with Lance, under the stars.)

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you ao3 user sunnyknight, who commented on this (what was originally going to be) oneshot and inspired me to turn it into a two-shot.
> 
> and thanks to all of the rest of you who responded when i asked if i should write a keith pov!! i hope this is okay!!

**Author's Note:**

> since im officially going in a different direction with six feet over than I had originally planned, its ok for me post this and not have to fear about overusing tropes
> 
> (OH WHO AM I KIDDING, I LOVE REINCARNATION THEMES I LOVE EM)
> 
> thanks for reading <3 <3
> 
> [my tumblr](http://isabelmagnolia.co.vu)


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